Incendiary
by Missie2
Summary: Rose arrives at a conclusion just as things go very, very wrong. Part 23 of Breaking Down, for other stories in the series click on my username.


**Incendiary**

Note to my readers: All right lads, if you thought things were serious before, I'm actually taking the gloves off proper now. From here on in, it's going to get very grim. Please note that very little of the upsetting subject matter I have written about is not based in reality. Use your discretion, only read if you think you can handle it, and if you find yourself very unhappy with what's going on, please let me know so we can talk it through.

…..

" _ **You can only subject people to anguish who have a conscience. You can only punish people who have hopes to frustrate or attachments to sever; who worry what you think of them. You can really only punish people who are already a little bit good."**_

 ** _-We Need To Talk About Kevin, Lionel Shriver_ **

It was tempting to think that the strike back against the zoatox had been simple, straightforward. Gemkind had the superior technology, they were objectively stronger, they had order and discipline. Every gem in its place, they were a machine.

But it had not been simple at all. For every hive they destroyed, there were three more that built up under their feet. Every one zoatox that managed to escape could breed a hundred more. They were simple in their goals, relentless in their numbers, and terrifying in their aggression. It was like trying to eradicate grains of sand. Diamond Core's sacrifice had been the only way to finish them off for good, and even hundreds of orbits later they couldn't be sure it had worked entirely.

 _Just one could set the whole thing off again. You know that._

At least the struggle had brought solidarity. Each gem fit into their assigned roles with ease, and with every gem shattered another one stepped in to fill the gap. For every hundred Jades lost on the scouting missions, three hundred were plucked from the dirt to take their places. For every platoon of Jaspers that fell under a wave of screaming, twitching monstrosities, ten more stretched back across the battlefield.

It seemed like they had never had any quarrel with each other when the zoatox was every gem's terror, although that couldn't be true. They had just all put it to one side to face a common enemy. Without that common enemy, what was left? Why have Jasper platoons with nothing to fight? Even their dealings with the troublesome fauna on other planets they had occupied had not been enough to keep the Jaspers busy. Most newly-formed Jaspers would never face an enemy in the field they could not easily overpower.

 _Could that be why they're being targeted?_

Rose turned the matter over in her head, over and over and over...Diamond Core had once praised her insight, her willingness to understand. So why couldn't she understand this?

She turned on her side to speak with her companion, and for a blessed moment forgot what she had been thinking.

"You got dressed again?" she asked with a chuckle.

Furiously blushing, Pearl nodded, looking at her feet. She'd left the stockings off at least, so that Rose could run her fingers up and down her long, smooth legs.

The physical side of their relationship was slow to start; Rose was very much aware of how skewed the balance of power was in her favour. She was always conscious to hold back her passions, difficult as it was (she was a desperately amorous beast) to make sure Pearl was completely comfortable with what they got up to in the rest pod.

It was much easier once they were both unclothed and tumbling in privacy, but Pearl was painfully shy in all other respects. Rose wondered if it was a natural tendency for Pearls without their spikes to be so guarded with their bodies. It made sense; they had so little control with their spikes intact and under the ownership of other gems.

Rose was still bare, and she revelled in it. She stretched languidly to display her charms fully, enjoying the heat in Pearl's answering gaze.

"I've been thinking," she began with a sigh. There was no good way to bring this up. "I need to speak to Emerald again. I'd rather not, but she knows more about zoatoxes than anyone. And I'd like for you to..."

"No."

Rose paused, gaped at her, floundered for words. On the one hand she was proud of her for refusing without hesitating, on the other hand...

"Please," she begged. "I know how you feel, but she won't lay a hand on you while I'm there. I need you to record what she says, we made almost no documents on the zoatox while we were fighting them."

Pearl didn't answer her, but she had curled in on herself, hugging her knees and refusing to look at Rose. Her mouth was set in an obstinate line.

"She has a new pearl," Rose told her, and noted how her spine straightened at those words. "I would like to see if she's okay, as much as she can be with Emerald... and I can't ask her myself. I'd like you to talk with her pearl for me."

Pearl's face twisted unhappily, but finally she nodded. For the rest of the cycle, Rose kept her hands to herself. She didn't want to push her luck.

…..

"What, you think it's zoatoxes behind this?" Emerald laughed her low, booming laugh.

"Consider it for more than a moment," Rose said, pinning her with her most authoritative glare. "Is it possible? Answer me truthfully."

The cheerful smile on Emerald's face melted away as she realized Rose was serious. She cleared her throat, motioned for her pearl to come forward. She ordered a compound mix and took a long gulp before she started.

"Sure, it's possible," she began, uncharacteristically grim. "They blew stuff up on Croixic 7, and on Mephasus 10 and 13. They used some sort of internal organic fission, we never figured out the mechanics of it. Usually they waited until the hive was mostly destroyed, sort of a back-up plan to take out as many of us as they could. It wasn't any more complicated than that, they just don't have the brain power for any kind of strategy."

"They launched targeted attacks before," Rose reminded her. "They sent in infected Jaspers. Took out entire platoons like that."

"You don't have to tell me, I was there," Emerald chuckled without humour, tapping her gem just above the crack.

Rose blinked at the sight of it. Usually Emerald had it covered, but not today. It looked darker than before, suffused with black jagged lines. A little of the old fondness she had held for her dear friend came rushing to the surface, past the knowledge of what she had done.

"Have you been getting that patched?" she asked.

"Of course," Emerald shrugged. "But you said yourself, the substrate's not distilled enough."

"Did I?" Rose couldn't recall discussing the substrate issue with Emerald...

"It's not a big deal," Emerald said with a casual wave. "I've not lost any mass I couldn't afford to lose. Anyway, back to zoatoxes..."

Emerald rambled on about her own battlefield glory; Rose had heard it all before. Her eyes strayed over to Pearl, sat on a low step. She looked utterly still but Rose spotted the tiny flickers of movement that signalled a conversation. Sure enough, Emerald's pearl was matching those little flickers with her own.

She was nondescript for a pearl. Yellow-toned with long, straight hair pushed away from her face with a band, plainly dressed in a pale blue shift, no decoration to speak of. And yet there was something odd about her, something in the way she moved...

"...oh! I do remember something useful!" Emerald crowed suddenly, and Rose snapped back to pay attention to her.

"The video feed from the explosion sites were lost, but you should be able to scrounge up some of the audio feed from the servers. The zoatoxes always made this noise before they blew up. Hold on, I'll demonstrate."

Sharply, she whistled through her teeth and the pearl approached. Emerald yanked her forward to sit her across her knees. She could crush the pearl easily with one arm, Rose thought with an internal grimace.

"Show her that thing I taught you," Emerald commanded.

The pearl opened her mouth and what came out was utterly alien but at the same time horrifically familiar. It was the zoatox scream, a high shrill note wavering louder and louder until it finished with a swooping howl.

Emerald laughed and patted the pearl's head indulgently.

"If you hear that noise on the audio, it's zoatoxes. I'd bet my life on it."

…..

She was thinking so hard in the antechamber that she barely noticed when White arrived for the meeting.

 _She said she's doing fine. Emerald has been good to her so far._

That hadn't quite been the meaning of Pearl's conversation with Emerald's pearl, but gesture-speak was near impossible to translate into Gem Common-speak. She couldn't shake the feeling that something was off...

"PINK!"

Rose spun sharply on her heel, nearly went to summon her shield. White was holding up her hands in a placating gesture, annoyance writ large across her face.

"One might think you'd have more of your wits about you during these times, Pink," she grumbled. "What's got you so rattled?"

Rose gulped. There would never be a better time to bring it up.

"I was speaking with Emerald today. I have a theory about the explosion..." she began.

"I don't think we should be discussing this without Blue and Yellow," White warned.

"I'd rather discuss it with you first," Rose told her.

"Rose..." White groaned.

" _Alabaster..."_ Rose countered.

White winced. She'd not been referred to by her old name for quite some time.

"All right, fine. Tell me what you think."

"I think it's zoatoxes. I think at least one survived and they're gearing up to breed again. And I think they're sending out their disposable units to take out our strongest troops."

White groaned, stretching.

"Come on, Pink! You and I both know they can't plan like that..."

"I'm not saying they planned it, I'm saying they've evolved to infiltrate. They've done it before. And what else do we know of that blows up and doesn't leave a trace?"

"Okay, suppose you're right. All the more reason for us to get the infusions started," White shrugged.

"What? No!" Rose sputtered. "We need to find a way to screen gems for infection, we never had that kind of time before but if we could root them out..."

She trailed off, realizing that White was now taller than before. She had tried to conceal it by crouching, folding herself over, but it was clear. Her features were bigger, her mass swelling with every breath.

"You've started the infusions," Rose whispered.

"Why wait?" White said quietly. "If it is zoatoxes, better now than later."

"Are you prepared to die the way Diamond Core did, then? Is that what this is about?"

"Why not?" White growled. "There was only one of her, and there's four of us."

…..

Fluorite's head practically scraped the floor as she bowed. Rose wondered if she should have called ahead rather than just stopping by unexpectedly.

"Yes, yes, that's all fine," Rose said as she helped Fluorite to her feet. "I won't visit long. I just wanted to see how your Jaspers are."

"They're very well, your grace," Fluorite told her. "Not a single flaw between them, and we only lost two on the last skirmish."

"Have any of them been acting suspiciously, to your knowledge?"

"Suspicious?" Fluorite pondered, rubbing her gem. "No, can't say they have. Except..."

"Except what?"

"Well, this recent business with the...bombs...it's got them a bit rattled..."

"We don't know that there's bombs involved," Rose told her curtly.

"Oh, of course, your grace, I didn't mean to suggest..." Fluorite stumbled over her words, now visibly nervous. "It's just what they've been saying amongst themselves...you know how they get...they're not much for thinking..."

"Has there been any behaviour you consider to be odd or out-of-character?" Rose interrupted.

"No, your grace. They've been a bit tense with the explosions and that, but nothing to give us any trouble."

"What about their pearl?" Rose sighed, rubbing her temple.

"Pearl? There's no pearl here! It's not allowed," Fluorite chuckled nervously.

"Of course there isn't," Rose groaned.

…..

She sat in the forecourt by the barracks for a while after, thinking. She could feel that she was onto something, and even with the other Diamonds opposed to her there had to be something she could do...talk to some of the best Kunzites about creating a screen, perhaps run a small terraform on an occupied planet for raw material...it had the potential to keep them all busy, and reduce the strain on Homeworld altogether. Somehow they could turn it into a blessing, even...

Other gems milled about; it was a community district close to the shopping thoroughfare. Rose watched them meet with their friends, stop to chat to neighbours. A little group of Jaspers flirted and called out to passing gems...

On one of the low benches, a pearl was sitting by herself. Rose hadn't paid her much mind; she'd thought her to belong to a Larimar who was flirting with one of the Jaspers. But the Larimar left, and the pearl remained.

Had she been forgotten? Was she lost? Surely if she was lost someone would have come to bring her to the impound...

The pearl's eyes flickered upwards, and they caught Rose's eyes dead on. They were green eyes, very green. Rose thought she could see something moving in them.

There was a screech, a blast, and the fiery wind that followed. When Rose regenerated, she was lying under a pile of burning debris. Her ears were ringing.

…..

Note: If you want to hear what the zoatox sounds like, I based it off of Ramiel from the Evangelion Rebuild anime. Some of its locomotion is based on Ramiel too, and a good portion off of the Xenomorph. Basically I don't want you to sleep tonight.


End file.
